Experienced Social Media Marketers Add More Goals, Metrics

Marketers with more than a year’s social experience like Facebook less

For many marketers, social media is no longer a new channel to reach customers and potential customers. As companies gain experience with using social media, they expect more from it—and from themselves.

A study from Brandon Hall Group and Covario broke US marketing executives down based on how long their company had been doing social media marketing. All respondents said social media was part of their integrated marketing strategy.

Asked about the objectives of their social media marketing initiatives, respondents with at least a year’s experience were more likely to choose each individual survey response, an indication that they were also more likely to select multiple responses.

They had similarly increased their usage of metrics to measure their success according to these objectives, the survey found. Less than half of respondents who had been marketing with social media for less than a year used any one of the metrics listed. Among more experienced marketers, a majority used each measurement, except purchasing transactions.

Different expectations have also led to different opinions about the effectiveness of various social media venues. While 76% of less experienced marketers thought Facebook was the most effective social site, just 61% of more experienced marketers agreed. Facebook was still the top-rated site among marketers using social media for more than a year, but those social media veterans had a more favorable opinion of Twitter (16% vs. 12%) and YouTube (6% vs. 0%) compared to the other group.

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